21 jazz poems on the 21st of October, 2026

October 21st, 2026

An ongoing series designed to share the quality of jazz poetry continuously submitted to Jerry Jazz Musician.

As always, thanks to the poets who participate in this growing community…

Enjoy!

Joe Maita

Editor/Publisher

Want to submit your work? Click here

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via Pxhere

Extremes

Jazz can both soothe and surprise
If described as cool, it floats along
But suddently the mood changes
Key signatures, even odd rhythms
Just when you thought it was safe
It is like Hell having broken loose
But then, all of it was intentional
Never any accidental meandering
Except in following the emotion
Hopefully shared, even if difficult
But then, that is jazz, so welcome

by Howard Osborne

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For Instance…

I read Gwendolyn Brooks
When I need some inspiration
A scenic route / Ancestors on the horizon
Butterflies in my hair! / The taste of hominy
& home

……………………………………………I want to live like this:
Armful of jazz LPs / One foot in the next world
Ease & satisfaction in this one
……………………………………………You are my testimony
……………………………………………I am your illuminating
……………………………………………Wake-up call

Every ..vantage point
Of this city feels like ……………a revelation!
…………………..On my vintage Smith-Corona
./ .I type out the words that describe the
Hieroglyphics of your .bluster
& ever-evolving ..back story
As the world whispers: .…never forever
& the universe replies: ..always forever

I want to accompany you on the bass!
I want to be your favorite line from
A Gwendolyn Brooks stanza

……………………………..Come with me
……………………………..As I wander!
Play jazz in a way that feels
Like impeccable love

by Connie Johnson

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.
Dharma Strums
(Re-reading Dharma Bums with guitar music accompaniment)

Strings caress
fingers press chords
in single note splendor;
electronic buzz feed
now leads
into a new realm,
a strange screed
or a mellow dream.

Shall we stroll a Jim Hall
with soft step beauty or
pounce like Joe Puma
at an angle from above.
Stagger a Frisell frazzle bridge
between Americana and
Buster Keaton daredevil nirvana.
Perhaps take a Charlie Christian
solo flight into
a one way ticket night?

The guitar song in our veins
six string or twelve
or even jazz banjo by Chuck Wayne,
as entrancing as a train whistle
heading west
or San Francisco dharma poetry
strumming the rhythm of new America’s
Kerouac beatific songbook bop.

by Daniel Warren Brown

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Epistrophy

There are those times when fiery night
can almost seem like something speaking,
or better yet like something spoken,
as if some ancient messages were lost
within the scattered matter of our sky,
the filaments of a long-expired tongue,
a voiceless detritus that drifts like algae
in the silent, phosphorescent dark.

But just perhaps it’s not the brute
materiality, the stuff out there, that seems
to signal us like speech, but the twirling
that its conflagration lets us see, the way
all seen things glow and swirl and spin
themselves to ash, like Monk who, whirling
in a transport of unheard sound, hauled us
always backwards to the end again, into
the wake of a going-nowhere shaped
like song, into each delirious melody,
into the endless ending that’s eternity.

by DB Jonas

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Fred Hersch Pervades
A Still Moment

tantalizing they are
…………..those seemingly
………………………….incongruous
upper keyboard
…………..series of notes one
………………………….after another broken
like shattered
…………..glass pieces tumbling
………………………….reflecting color beauty
sometimes as spectrum
…………..glistening in the sunlight
………………………….determined by turbulent clouds

by Terrance Underwood

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All the Things You Are
(Gerry Mulligan & Bill Taylor)

Brown background with bass and clarinet
Trumpeter carefully damps his horn
Trombone slides into center stage
Whilst the piano man covers the place
In a mist of reed swaying breeze.

Bronze sax bows after the solo plays
Black clarinet carries us away
To a place that exits in us all—

A place in sand with a few date palms
It waits like the Arabian empty quarter
A camel or two, a night in Tunisia
Well spent, an oasis just for the few.

by DH Jenkins

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Soon

Be-bop
Stop
Have you
Heard the word
On the street?
You’re obsolete
Your children don’t know you
Your parents are dead
The vision once potent
Has softened like lead
But you are here
Be-bop mistress
Won’t you rise up again?
Call out your sirens
Enmesh your men
Bring poetry to techno
Lower the lights
Come cool with the sway
And recapture the night.

by Jonathan D. Andrews

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Full Weight

blow horn
…………………..blow,
push the winds
wake the dead
drive the clouds
and stir
the cities
as the Jazz
marches in
like circus
elephants
pounding out
a rhythm
as the sounds
settle into
back rooms
where waiting
souls’ thirst
as the music
feeds them
full

by Roger Singer

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Jazz Spazzin’

Jazz, spazzin’. Imagining
horns, flutes – the way instruments
compute. Computing, moving, soothing.
I have to with these stanzas. I stanza
to answer the rhythms of jazz.

I am jazz spazzin’. I am jazz speaking,
reaching for new heights of jammin’.

I am samplin’ sound. I am grammatically
gettin’ down. Down to the core. Down
to the soaring of syllables.

Each syllable
Is rhythmical,
Scientific.

Not a word
is identical.

This is word-saying.
Wordplaying.
Playing patterns.
Punching poetry
with floetry.

I am jazz spazzin’. I am casting
a new way to communicate, craft.
Measuring the math between each
tone. This is tonal. Terrific. Intrinsic,
specific to jazz and jargon.

Pardon the poetics. Forgive the phonics.
I am only being honest and paying homage
to the music that saves me, that prays in me,
that leads me to safety.

Jazz spazzin’ for somethin’. Somethin’ out
of nothin’. Nothin’ into somethin’. Writing
into exciting. Exciting into enlightening.

Spoken the well-woven into the ethos.
So the be-bop remains close.
So I continue to get a dose of the delicious,
the deliciousness of jazz.

Yes, that’s what’s happenin’!

I am jazz spazzin’!

by Christopher D. Sims

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Tap Dance

Footloose
Carefree
Bust a move
Athletic
Yet discreet
Steel tips
Toe tap
Heel drop
Hip Hop
Triplets with the feet
Baggy pants
Song and dance
Prance
Round a chair
Stomp
Shuffle
Chasse’
Bound
Through the air
Top hats
Taps
Spats
Canes and bowlers
A sprinkle of panache
A hint of Fred Astaire
Feints
Pirouettes
Paradiddles
Artistry in rhythm
Poetry in motion
Drum solo meets ballet
The spirit
Set free
Such joy
Such grace
And always
The smiles
Those eternal smiles
Painted on
Disguise the sweat
And toil
Effortless
Or so it seems
Thus deceived
We dream
A world
Free of pain
Such ease
They shift and swirl
Their cares away
We can but imagine
Life would be that way
Footloose
Carefree
Not a trouble in the world
Singing in the rain

by David Nemerov

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Electric

Electric blues sounds good,
But it sounds too good,
Polished, like a gourmet meal.
It doesn’t have that organic home baked sound-
The authentic acoustic flavour of a lost soul
Wandering about the wind- sense about it,
It’s spiced with too much city
With too little country herb,
More artificial neon than authentic evening.
It sure sounds good,
Just not good as it would sound it if didn’t.

by Anthony Ward

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Skip James

Skip James made claim
His songs appeared in dreams
Fully-formed
A haunting other-worldly ambience
Attests the truth in this – they stand aloof
His cool poetic temperament
Considering the vagaries of man
Makes his stance appear
More custodian than singer

When Skip James was in the hospital
A friend played him a tape
Cream’s combustive bombast
Assumed his signature-song
‘I’m So Glad’
He listened then he said
‘I guess they just don’t get it’

Dispassionate as a Delta
Delphic Oracle of harp-like minor chords
Falsetto vocal swoops and glides
Few believed back then
Black ‘gladness’ might contra-indicate
Undiagnosed grief and depression
This did not appear in European
Textbook interpretation

Re-discovered then re-set in concert
He seemed a self-reliant soloist –
Some knew Robert Johnson
Had listened to his records
Absorbed his eerie supernatural charm –
Subtle and urbane as modern jazz
He invited listeners into his trance
Played his psychic vision of the blues

by Bernard Saint

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We’re In the Money
……….…for Russell

that summer Dad was on the road
with the circus
his trombone playing
carnival tunes instead
of jazz, but it was a steady gig

when he came home
he herded us all into the kitchen
with quick hugs and kisses

then went by himself to the bedroom
closed the door so we couldn’t follow
and emptied his suitcase on the bed
a mountain of dollar bills

when he called us in
we ran our hands though
the treasure and sang
we’re in the money

while we tossed bills in the air
and they fell around us like
snow or butterflies
or random notes

riffs made of circus
jazz and kids
laughing

by Cheryl Savageau

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from the gods

in a space
that is infinite
there is infinite mercy /
jazz at our fingertips &
in our thirsty lungs.

come breathe it.

upon this small atlas
I found you. ./ .I recognized you.
my mood was disjointed ./. but
I was still elated to see you.

now we are closely aligned
& what I feel is… infinite
mercy.

what I feel is the.. backbeat
of abandoned expectations.

what I see is a shrine to the scat
& the lore of your praiseworthy
exaltations.

what I hear is
………………jazz
………….from
……..the
gods.

By Connie Johnson

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Steve Lacy and Don Cherry

on a satuday night, jazz is
just an empty bottle of rose;
a souvenir to a lost moment

a hankerchief, bearing lipstick
a momento from once was

you think of her, and her laughter fills
the room, just as she filled your arms

you thank god for her, even if
it was all a dream

by erren geraud kelly

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deep in a dream

something my skin recalls
about the needle’s crackling
golden hour lace curtains
………………………..~summer breeze~

you can hear a clean room
shuffling shoes
in the way dusk and Ella
ricochet

a sepia dream tingling
my grandma felt in her skin
waiting for her sailor
to come home

stockings on farmhouse floor
but he wasn’t like that anymore

by deb Ewing

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At the Tender Trap

A lavender dress……… black-strapped spikes
rhinestone-stud earrings
A Dewars on the rocks with John Violin

Old Blue Eyes
Fly me to the Moon

I love John’s cool, easy and even,
soothing as a skylark’s t u n e.

You’re just a kid, he says.
A big enough kid for you, I say.

His summer girl lives light years away.
She’s too old for you, I say.

Let me swing among the stars.
The strings play second fiddle to the brass.
Let me know what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars.

John’s too good for me, knows I’m fiddling,
sees through my girlish ploys.

My knee against his,
a second scotch, a cigarette ash.
He fingers my illusion sleeve.

by Elizabeth Dolan

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Comforting Loving Arms

Yearning to remember
Praying to forget
Myriad of melodies
Persona quick connect

…..Phrasings vary widely
…..Broadway lyrics tease
…..Whimsical scat fantasy
…..Fleet rhyming vocalese

……….Soulful meditation
……….Heartfelt memorized
……….Mine? – Nat & Ella vocals
……….Hymnlike redempton prized

……………Assuring arrangements
……………Gracefully endure
……………Medicinal listening
……………Miraculously cure

………………..Respites for the journey
………………..Fending off all harm
………………..Endearing jazz selections
………………..Comforting loving arms

by Mike Mignano

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Errant Seed

It comes on a Coltrane note

..………………The only way to ever see the light of day
………………..or the dark of night for that matter
………………..is through the eyes of a blind eunuch.

………………..So I asked the master of ceremonies when
………………..do the lions leap through those blazing hoops?
………………..She turned her dried Granny Smith head
………………..laughed and spit a seed in my general direction
………………..I ducked and the seed sped past me
………………..serrating the air at about 90mph
………………..finally resting in the neck of the customer
………………..in seat #77

………………..The gendarmerie came upon the seen
………………..and arrested the MC,
………………..Customer in seat #77 was ok except for a little paranoia.
………………..Seems she was a long time user of blood thinners
………………..and was a bit concerned about the possibility
………………..of excessive blood loss
………………..She calmed down when the medic informed her
………………..it was just a flesh wound
………………..caused by an errant apple seed.

It came on a Coltrane note

by Frank Papia

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Here to Stay

wild women and men of gentle manner
charmed by the rhythm of the hunt
senses heightened and then enlightened

smooth walls rebound the sound
of sultry saxophone
double bass thumping and brushes on snare
floating piano and Gibson guitar

the singer exhales her smoky Holiday song
as they improvise the jazz of love
the jive of our lives
and practise until it’s imperfect

by Penny Sarmada

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Visualized
While Hearing
Charles Lloyd Play
Black Butterfly Today

gathered for a taste of budding nectar
at the Butterfly bush (Buddleja davidii)
common Monarchs hover with various Longwings,
Swallowtails, Cloudless Sulphurs, even Great Southern Whites
without taking issue of the Black Butterflies of any stripe
beyond a bit of imprudent dart & flutter
all mixing for the same
knowing as they do that reception
depends on less aggrieved situations than appearance
particularly those pertaining to pollination
rejuvenating beauty & the continued color of things

by Terrance Underwood

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POET BIOGRAPHIES

Jonathan D. Andrews is a poet and mediator based in San Diego, California. His poems have appeared in the San Diego Poetry Annual, the Journal of Progressive Human Services. It will appear in the Jerry Jazz Musician anthology, Black History in Poetry, Vol. I: Unerased and Deeply Rooted.

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Daniel Warren Brown has loved jazz (and music in general) ever since he delved into his parents’ 78 collection as a child. He is a retired special education teacher who began writing as a senior. He always appreciates being published in journals and anthologies. At age 72 he published his first collection Family Portraits in Verse and Other Illustrated Poems through Epigraph Books, Rhinebeck, NY. Daniel writes daily about music, art and whatever else catches his imagination.

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Liz Dolan is a nine-time Pushcart nominee, and also Best of the Net. Her short story collection, Catholic, Practicing, was published last April by Cave Moon Press. Her two published poetry collections are They Abide and A Secret of Long Life. She is the proud grandmother of ten; she hangs with her posse in Rehoboth Beach, DE.

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deb Ewing is still doing all the same old things: peer-reviewing for Consilience Science-based Poetry Journal, typesetting for Igneus Press, painting tiny things on coins, the usual. Her mission statement remains “Art is War.” You might find deb’s short sci-fi at Coffin Bell Journal in July, or her physical person at FAR-West 2024 in Woodland Hills, CA, in October. Follow @DebsValidation on Twitter and Instagram.
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(Editor’s Note: deb’s short story “Coloring Outside the Lines” was the first winning story in the Jerry Jazz Musician Short Fiction Contest, published in October of 2002. The contest is currently in its 73rd edition)

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DH Jenkins’ poems have appeared in Jerry Jazz Musician, Kinds of Cool—an interactive collection of Jazz Poetry 2025 (Unsolicited Press), The Ekphrastic Review and The Wave, Kelp Journal, as well as in Ocean Poetry Anthology 2024 (Kelp Books), Ocean Poetry Anthology 2025(Kelp Books). For many years he was a professor of Speech and Writing for UMUC-Asia, living and working in Japan and Korea. While in residence there, he received the Bylee Massey Award for a project in the Humanities, as well as the Drazek Excellence in Teaching Award. He now lives in New Zealand.

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Connie Johnson has multiple Pushcart Prize nominations for poetry. A California-based writer, she has authored Everything is Distant Now (Blue Horse Press) and I Have Almost Everything (Boats Against the Current). In a Place of Dreams, her digital chapbook (containing audio readings/personal narrative), was published by Jerry Jazz Musician. Click here to view it.

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DB Jonas is the author of four collections of poetry: Tarantula Season and other Poems (2023), Flight Risk (2025), In Dubious Terrain: Lyric and Conjecture (2026) and Ut pictura: New and Selected Ekphrastics 2021-2026 (August 2026). Further examples of his work are accessible at jonaspoetry.com.

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Erren Kelly is a three-time Pushcart nominated poet from Boston whose work has appeared in 300 publications (print and online), including Hiram Poetry Review, Mudfish, Poetry Magazine, Ceremony, Cacti Fur, Bitterzoet, Cactus Heart, Similar Peaks, Gloom Cupboard, and Poetry Salzburg.

Click here to read “Under Quarantine” — COVID-era poetry of Erren Kelly, published by Jerry Jazz Musician

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Mike Mignano, retired Ocala, FL. Hometown Ithaca, NY. Interests include: history, travel, guitar, choral singing, nature walking, viewing sports, theatre and poetry.

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David Nemerov, 75, has been writing poems for a little over three years. His subjects are whatever comes to mind. Along with the poetry he moonlights as drummer with an affinity for Jazz, Blues, Zydeco, and whatever catches his fancy.

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Howard Osborne has written poetry and short stories, also a novel and several scripts. With poems published online and in print, he is a published author of a non-fiction reference book and several scientific papers many years ago. He is a UK citizen, retired, with interests in writing, music and travel.

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Frank Papia is a San Francisco native currently living in Sacramento, California. His poems have appeared in various publications, including: Dream Machine – Madhouse House: An Anthology of Thorns-
Lone Mt. Press – Tarantula #’s 4&6 issues 1&2 – and most recently in L’Hoxa International Art Magazine #88 Poetry Issue. He also has two published works, Rhumba of the Heart and Lefty’s Boys-Along the Way to
Now – both of which can be found on Blurb.com

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Bernard Saint is a U.K. poet who has published in U.K. and United States literary magazines since the 1960’s. He is a regular contributor to International Times. His most recent book is ROMA, published by Smokestack Books. He worked as a therapist and supervisor in the U.K. National Health Service in psychiatry and in addiction recovery.

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Penny Sarmada is from Ontario and currently lives in the key of B minor. Work appears in places like Pithead Chapel, Cotton Xenomorph and Bullshit Lit.

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Cheryl Savageau is a poet, writer, artist, and pianist. Honors include Fellowships from the NEA, Massachusetts Artists Fellowship Program, and MacDowell, and two Pushcart nominations. Her hybrid memoir, Out of the Crazywoods, is now available in paperback. Two new poetry collections are out for publication.

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Christopher D. Sims is a writer of poetry, a spoken word artist, and a human rights activist who uses words to inform. Born and raised on the west side of Rockford, Illinois, he has been writing since he was nine years old. A published poet, Christopher wrote a poetry and memoir collection entitled I was Born and Raised in The Rock in 2020. He is a fellow of the Intercultural Leadership Institute.

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Dr. Roger Singer was in private chiropractic practice for 38 years in upstate New York, and served as a medical technician during the Vietnam era. Dr. Singer is the Poet Laureate of Old Lyme, Connecticut, and has had over 1,070 poems published on the Internet, magazines and in books, and is a 2017 Pushcart Prize Award Nominee. He is also the President of the Shoreline Chapter of the Connecticut Poetry Society.

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Terrance Underwood is a retired Gas Turbine Package Engineer whose career offered opportunities to work all over the world. A devoted jazz enthusiast, his first memory operating a mechanical devise was a 4-speed spindle drop record changer for his father’s collection of 78s. In 2024, he was nominated by Jerry Jazz Musician for a Pushcart Prize.

Click here to read Proceeding From Behind: A collection of poems grounded in the rhythmic, relating to the remarkable, by Terrance Underwood

Click here to read his collection of poems “With Ease in Mind”

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Anthony Ward chooses to write because he has no choice. He writes to get rid of himself and lay his thoughts to rest. He derives most of his inspiration from listening to classical music and jazz since it is often the mood which inspires him. He has recently been published in Jerry Jazz Musician, Synchronized Chaos, Literary Yard, Mad Swirl, Shot Glass Journal and Ariel Chart.

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Click for:

Previous collections of “21 jazz poems on the 21st”

The Sunday Poem

More poetry on Jerry Jazz Musician

Poems on Charlie “Bird” Parker (inspired by a painting by Al Summ) – an ekphrastic poetry collection

War. Remembrance. Walls. The High Price of Authoritarianism – by editor/publisher Joe Maita

“La Fontaine,” Ashlee Trahan’s winning story in the 72nd Jerry Jazz Musician Short Fiction Contest

More short fiction on Jerry Jazz Musician

Information about how to submit your poetry or short fiction

Subscribe to the (free) Jerry Jazz Musician quarterly newsletter

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